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Wednesday, August 03, 2016

Character Profile of Alexander Sinclair: Reliquary’s Choice by Melissa Macfie

Character Profile of Alexander
Sinclair:

Alexander Sinclair was a
likely candidate for Druid Shaman from birth, having the blessing of being the
son of Nimue, the moon goddess. Standing at 6’4, he was well-muscled from a
combination of strenuous physical labor and weapons training with his
half-brothers. He was raised by Robert Sinclair, his chieftain father, who
allowed him to become an initiate of ancient Druidic custom. Alex ascended the
ranks from initiate to novice insatiably learning Druid history and rituals. He
rose further to Master Bard, the highest of that caste aside from Shaman; but
he was also a warrior, and very few showed affinities for more than one line of
devotion. He was blessed, and thereby
favored and…spoiled.

When the Coven formed,
Alex was asked as all others of the warrior caste to uphold the balance until the
priestess was found. He readily assented and the vows were taken in Tir-Na-Nog
with the gods in attendance. Strong-willed and impertinent, he overstepped and
touched Caer Ibormeith, the goddess of prophecy. He knew his mistake
immediately when she turned, her blue eyes clouding over with the vision.

I ha’ erstwhile seen ye Shaman made,

By yer ill-advised actions many years will fade.

Hunted and hounded, separated from wha’ ye hold most dear,

Joined in th’ eternal Hunt ye shall find fear.

Set free only at th’ Hunter’s caprices,

Compelled ta seek th’ lost one.

Hunting throughout every nation,

Will wha’ ye find be yer destruction
or salvation?

In the next hour, he took the place
of the previous Shaman and was gifted with the ivory
torc, the ornament of office for the Druid Shaman. It is the shackle that
tethers Alexander Sinclair to this world and that of the Tuatha Dé Danann. The
carved likenesses of wolf, hawk, leopard, and bear are representations of his
totem beasts; each called upon in turn for their tracking, eyesight, stealth,
and attack power. Though not limited to these four, shifting is easier if there
is a focus.

Alex lost his idealism and his faith after centuries of searching having nothing
but a vague reference from ancient prophecy and the cruel insistence of the god
Cernunnos pressing him into servitude. Who
the priestess was and when she was
still a mystery. The god’s impatience
grew thin and Alex was punished. His soul was ripped from him and he was cast
into the Wild Hunt to serve as new prey.

The
Wild Hunt, a parody of the balance he was sworn to protect, the hunter and the
hunted paradigm, is eternal. Six hundred years after cementing his own fate, he
stands more monster than man gifted by those same gods to make a more
challenging pursuit. Manifested by scarlet and indigo sigils across his chest,
abdomen, and arms, with each resurrection, a new ability and matching sigil is
added.

Despising his own imprisonment, Alex swore he would never take
anyone’s freedom; however, the Coven has been polluted by greed. Now that the
priestess has been found, he is duty bound to set her on a path of no return. He must convince her that she
is the prophesied Druid high priestess and teach her to use her powers in time
to defend against the Coven. Her own safety depends on it, but in order to do
that she must
say goodbye to her family forever to traverse time. She is the only one who can
fulfill the ancient prophecy.

With the Coven closing in, Alex flees with Brenawyn to Tir-Na-Nog, even though he knows he is setting her on a path of no return. Brenawyn must say goodbye to her family forever and traverse time. She is the only one who can fulfill an ancient prophecy.

But what is Alex hiding? Has he condemned Brenawyn to serve the gods forever? Or will the depth of his sacrifice bring salvation to them both?

In Book Two of The Celtic Prophecy, Alex prepares Brenawyn to travel to ancient Scotland to claim her rightful place.

The wicked edge of the curved blade glinted in the meager light shed
by the candles. Cormac hardened himself against the revulsion and fear of the
Oracle’s feather-light touch. The popping of stitches, a sharp burrup, rent the air. He’d have torn the
shirt off over his head if he did not know that it would destroy her ability to
scry for Sinclair and the would-be priestess. He wrestled with his will to keep
his composure when she was so near. He fought to maintain his breathing, fought
against the shaking and increased heartbeat. He could not reveal his
vulnerability. He knelt so she could lift the remnants of the shirt off his
shoulders as if it were some holy artifact.

The Oracle’s dead eye rounded on him. He didn’t know if she could see
out of it, but it was unnerving. The white sclera, still oozing mucus, pinned
him to the spot. He had no choice but to focus on it.

I’m set upon a
course that there is no return. I have pitted myself against your father. Find
it in your heart to forgive me. Someday.

I have dreams.
Terrible dreams. Prophetic visions more like. Headaches—migraines with searing
pain, followed by nose bleeds, dreams, blacking out, vomiting. I have never had
visions before. I don’t know of anyone who has. I am afraid to ask, in case it
gets back to him, your father.

These dreams, filled
with blood and pain, seeing people slaughtered, sacrificed. Blurred images of a
hunt. No leads though. They don’t seem to know where to start. Hunting
throughout the years, throughout the centuries. Doesn’t make sense. But I feel
they are hunting for you.

Choices to be made.

I haven’t helped. I
haven’t prepared you. I’ve hindered and perhaps I’ve signed your death
certificate. Did a botched job of binding your magic. Should have consulted
Mom, your grandmother. She wouldn’t have done it. Too late.

I have seen a
glimmer. Only if you choose the right path the world will be yours. Not in the
clichéd way, but you’re meant for bigger things. You weren’t supposed to be
born now. Or to me. You’re out of place, lost in the universe.

I’m begging.

Choose to live.

Slamming the book closed, Brenawyn slapped it on the nightstand and
vaulted off the bed. She felt like a bee in a jar. Trapped. Waiting. Thinking
to read to get her mind off of things she couldn’t understand, but yet the act
brought it all home. Her mother, if she hadn’t been crazy, had seen visions.
Did Brenawyn believe in that? What did the Church say about that?

Brenawyn shook her head to clear it. “You were off your rocker, lady.”
She looked around the room for distraction. She spied the boxes she’d hauled
from Jersey to her grandmother’s store in Salem and now to the farmhouse in the
New York countryside where she had taken refuge. She wrestled one of the boxes
down from the closet shelf and hefted it to the bed. She never thought she’d
admit it, but thinking about her dead husband Liam was preferable to worrying
about Druid lore, visions and prophecies, and of course, the Order, an ancient
group of Druids who seemed to have gotten her confused as the central character
in some ancient prophecy.

When she lifted the lid, mustiness wafted out, the box had been stored
for the three years since Liam had died in a car accident in New Jersey. The
smell made her crinkle her nose. A fat envelope lay on the top with photographs
spilling out. She picked them up, recognizing the first Christmas she and Liam
had shared together. The camera caught Liam in the middle of laughing at
something; she couldn’t recall what. She’d always loved his smile, she thought,
running her finger lovingly over the photo. It was what had attracted her to
him at the first. He had a stern face, but when he smiled; oh Lord, he had a
smile that would make an old woman blush.

Brenawyn leafed through the photos. There were pictures of their
honeymoon to Niagara Falls, pictures of their house, even before and after
shots of the renovations to the living room. Familiar faces of friends peered
out from the surfaces in chronological order, the organization did not surprise
here; Liam had always forced orderliness on life. Yes, they were all in order
except for two pictures that were stuffed into the middle of the stack;
pictures Brenawyn had never seen before.

In the first, Liam cradled a pretty blonde in his arms. The picture
captured the woman’s reaction, a hearty laugh at whatever Liam whispered in her
ear, his mouth so close to her neck. The other picture showed the same woman
sprawled on a blanket, a magnolia blossom in her hair.

Brenawyn looked down at the corner of the photo for a digital date
imprinted by the camera. Her mouth went dry. There had to be a mistake. The
date read April 2011, more than two years after Brenawyn and Liam married.

Brenawyn covered the pictures, willing them to disappear. But now that
she had seen them, she had to look again, no matter how reluctantly. Almost
blinded by tears, she uncovered them again to examine them and try to determine
the identity of the woman. No, she’d never seen her before. She wasn’t some
friend or acquaintance of theirs; they hadn’t been taken at some innocent party
or neighborhood get-together that Brenawyn could remember.

The way Liam, her husband, was looking at this blonde-haired woman was
just…Brenawyn threw the pictures in the trashcan beside the bed. I won’t even think about it. What good would
it do? Rage at the possibility that Liam had an affair? Now, three years after
he is gone? He never gave me any reason to doubt him. Disgusted with
herself, she grabbed the can and tore into the trash, finding the glossy photos
and storming stormed out to the living room to dispose of them. She found a
match, touched it to the photos, and after watching the flame take hold, tossed
the pictures into the empty fireplace.

Ashes.

Appropriate.

She stormed away, but returned just as quickly to watch the last of
the embers wink out. She stood there, silently considering the incriminating,
albeit circumstantial, evidence. “Ugh. Damn it!” She slammed her hand on the
mantle. “Do you even know that he’s dead?”

“Is everything a’aricht, a
chuisle?” She turned to find
Alex sitting in the leather wing chair in the shadowed recess of the room, book
on his knee.

Brenawyn’s breath hitched as she sighed. “Unpacking the last of the
boxes from the house I shared with my husband.” She glanced back at the
fireplace, “I found some pic…some unexpected things,” she amended.

“Ah lass, dae ye want ta talk about it?”

“No, thank you. I’d rather forget it all together.”

A few steps into the hall took her back to the bedroom door where she
stopped when she saw garbage strewn on the floor and her dog, Spencer, crouched
in the corner, chewing a used tissue. “Spencer, put that down!” The dog bolted
but Brenawyn wrestled him to the ground, prying his mouth open enough to
extract his treat. “Mine!” as she held the wet tissue aloft.

Sitting up, Brenawyn looked around her bedroom, now strewn with the
contents of the remaining boxes from her former home.

Three years. Three
years. If I close my eyes…picking up the phone to hear…seeing the wrecked guard
rail, the car…Ugh. Time doesn’t heal shit.

Brenawyn reached over for the box of tissues on the nightstand and
patted the bed beside her, “Come here, boy. Come on up.”

She caught the eighty-pound bundle of wriggling fur. Not content with
either licking her face or being as close to her as possible, Spencer did both
simultaneously. “Eww, no doggie kisses.” She scratched him under his collar.
“Who’s a good boy?” The dog tried one more time to sneak a last minute kiss
that barely missed her open mouth, before giving up and settling down with a
grunt as he nestled in, molding his body to her side. Absently she petted him,
“You didn’t know Liam. He was a good man, even though he was allergic to dogs.”

The next item in the box was a small notebook filled with her
husband’s tight neat script. She leafed through it before recognizing what it
was—the notebook that they shared when they took the philosophy class together
during their last year of college. How she managed to get an A in the class was
still a mystery to her when all she was concerned with was the heat of his body
as he sat next to her.

She pulled out the insurance papers she had seen too often. “Again?
How many copies did you keep? Did you think I would forget where they were?”
she said aloud. She could almost hear his voice. This is where copies of the insurance papersand the keys to the safety deposit box are… “How many times did we
argue over this?”

Brenawyn dropped the papers, pushed the box across the bed and flung
herself back on it, startling the dog. She didn’t move until she felt his wet nose
nuzzle her arm. “It’s okay, Spencer. Talking to you is one thing, but talking
to the dead husband… I need to stop that.”

Resolved to finish, she picked up the box and extracted the last item
in the container, a small wooden box. Brenawyn ran her hand along the ornate
brass fittings. Locked. She upended the box. No key. “Hmm.” Running her hands
along the back revealed a weak hinge. She tried prying the hinge with the edge
of her fingernail only to be thwarted when her nail broke. Sucking on the
injured finger, she unfolded herself from the bed and climbed over the unmoving
dog and searched among the items strewn on the floor for the screwdriver she
had seen earlier.

The hinges gave little resistance to the flathead screwdriver.
Reaching in, Brenawyn took out a brightly wrapped gift box complete with a
silver Mylar bow, flattened now after so long. She put the box on the
nightstand, hesitant to open it. Liam had always been giving her surprise
gifts. Packing his things away had been filled with the pain of finding boxes
and gift bags he had obviously stowed away to give her at some future date. Or had he meant them for that other woman?
The thought came unbidden to her mind, but she dismissed it quickly. It was
unfair to Liam. It was just that it had been so long since the last time she
stumbled upon a surprise like this from a man long dead.

~ ~ ~

Alex paced the room, but Brenawyn didn’t return. Keeping an ear to the
hallway, he strode over to the fireplace and sifted through the ashes. A soot
covered portion of a photo lay in the debris. Should he look at it? He
hesitated. The photo had obviously disturbed Brenawyn. He didn’t want to pry
into her private life, but considering the dangers they still faced, it seemed
necessary.

He stopped and plucked the photo from the fireplace, turning it over
in his hand to see the two faces there. He drew a surprised breath. He should
have expected this. Centuries may have passed, but Alex would always remember
the face of James Morgan. Hatred boiled up from his gut, he needed to hit
something.

He got some satisfaction as the brittle paper crumbled in his fist. He
wished it were that easy. Jamie never gave him the opportunity. Coward.

I found some
unexpected things. He paused. Was Jamie her husband? No, it cannae be. She had always called
him Liam. A common enough name; he had never connected it with James Liam
Morgan McAllister.

Damn him.

He needed to hit something.

A soft cry from the hallway pulled him back into the present and he
flexed his clenched fist.

Alex stopped at the open doorway to see Brenawyn reaching for a
wrapped gift on the nightstand. She fumbled with the paper, ripping at the
seams with her teeth until the box was dented. She found purchase and wiped the
bit of paper from her lip with one hand as the other pealed the paper away to
reveal a black velvet jewelry box. Closing her eyes and holding her breath, she
opened the box. He couldn’t see what was inside but the facets of the stones
spread sparkles across the ceiling as it caught the first rays of the day.

Brenawyn carefully removed the necklace and held it up. Dangling the
medallion from its chain as she approached the mirror, she traced the detailed
design. She looped it around her neck letting the medallion fall between her
breasts.

“Years later I’m still finding stuff you left for me? This is why I
couldn’t live there anymore. I’m trying to move on with my life.”

It was only then that she saw him in the doorway. She jumped. “Jesus,
you scared me.”

“Lass, wha’s wrong? Is thaur
anything I can dae ta help?”

“Eh. It’s nothing.” Sniffling
and wiping her eyes with the back of her hand so hard that she saw spots. “My
husband…” shaking her head, “my late husband would give me things, presents,
jewelry and other pretty things.” She carried the medallion to him, “Three
years after his death, I am still finding gifts.”

She dropped the necklace in his open hand and whirled to gather the
rest of the items back into the box. An exquisite medallion of gold Celtic knot
work with ruby, sapphire, emerald, diamond, and topaz gemstones glinted up from
his palm. He knew this necklace, could trace the pattern from memory, if he
needed more proof to convince him of what he already knew.

“Tis verra beautiful. It reminds me o’ another. Come haur. Thaur is
something…” Brenawyn straightened and met him, “I am curious about.” He looped
the necklace around her head lifting her hair so the chain fell again her skin.
He stepped back and looked unsatisfied, “The medallion needs ta be in contact
with yer skin,” and he went to make it so. Brenawyn pulled away blushing, his
fingertip losing contact with her collar.

“Ok, I’ll do it, thank you.” And she dropped the medallion in her
cleavage. “This is very strange. Necklaces are supposed to be worn outside…”

“Humor me.” His face must have given something away because her eyes
grew wide. “Turn around and leuk in the mirror.”

Her reflection showed glowing sigils across her clavicle, dimming
slightly across her shoulders to almost nothing as they tracked down her upper
arms. He saw recognition reflected in her eyes. He knew she was remembering his
explanation, “It is called Interlace; its path
represents the thread o’ life eternal, the crossings between the spiritual
world o’ Tir-Na-Nog and our own.”

These were the same iridescent markings as were present the after her recitation of the Lughnasa thanksgiving incantation in Salem. Alex came up behind her and held her about the waist and the
dimmed tracings burst to life, racing down her arms in matching intensity.

“What does this mean?” as she searched his face reflected in the
mirror.

“The necklace, or rather the
medallion, the chain has nay power, is Eiliminteach, a mythic piece, one
o’ five, drenched in Druid lore. Five pieces, scattered, hidden, until the one
is revealed. Foci most powerful for the priestess just as the torc is for the
Shaman.

“Why are my markings
activated by it? And why do they glow brighter at your touch?”

She turned to face him and
stepped back to look into his eyes, careful not to touch him.

“We are two halves ta a
whole,” he continued. “Shaman, priestess, man, woman, yin, yang, if ye will; we
represent balance, and because o’ that balance, the gods favor our union.”

“If it is as you say, why would my husband have it amongst his belongings?”

Everything stopped as the weight of her words beat on his heart. “I
ken yer husband a while sin.”
The words were out of his mouth before the decision to tell her registered in
his mind. How he would explain his connection to James, he had no clue. The
truth? Yeah, hadn’t she had enough of that?

Brenawyn looked at him, mouth agape. “How… how did you know Liam?”

“He never deserved yer loyalty. He wasnae a kind man.”

“What? You knew him?” Her arms uncrossed so that the robe gaped open.
“When?”

“Brenawyn, I shouldnae ha’ mentioned it. Twas a long time ago. Perhaps
he changed.”

“Liam and I were friends. I ken him as Jamie—James Liam Morgan
McAllister. It doesnae matter now. A woman came between us. We weren’t friends
any longer. End o’ story.” Alex brushed by her on his way out of the room,
knowing that she was right on his heels.

“Your story lacks detail.” Brenawyn caught his arm, “Please, tell me.
It’s been three years; I can’t get over his death. My memories are fading but
instead of making it better and allowing me to move on, I feel anxious and
panicked, as if there is something important that I’ve forgotten, but I can’t
recall it.”

Alex softly closed the door behind him, “Why, Jamie? Damn ye.” He
could have lived with the betrayal; eventually he would have stopped hating
them so much if it had been true. Perhaps it was on her part. He’d never know
after what Jamie had done to her. Now here he was centuries later with another
woman whose memories were violated and altered by the same depraved animal.

Damn him.

All for power.

Not this time.

Alex would give Brenawyn the truth even if she hated him as a result.

Jamie—Liam was dead.

It was time the façade died too.

About the Author:

For most of her life, Melissa Macfie has pursued artistic endeavors such as drawing, painting, and sculpting. She holds a M.Ed. in English Education from the Graduate School of Education at Rutgers University, and has spent the last sixteen years as a public school English teacher. She also spent a short time serving as the co-host of Alpha Centauri & Beyond, an Internet talk radio show about science and science fiction. She lives in New Jersey with her husband, Donald. Their children, Elizabeth and Donald, are grown and pursuing their own dreams.